


Ride or Die

by Peppermint_Shamrock



Series: Hallowshots [3]
Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Adrinette, Friendship, Gen, Humor, Pranks and Practical Jokes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-12-09 02:44:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20987525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Peppermint_Shamrock/pseuds/Peppermint_Shamrock
Summary: Alya and Nino convince Adrien to prank Marinette.The results are…unexpected.





	Ride or Die

**Author's Note:**

> A more lighthearted brand of slightly scary Marinette for today :) She'll do anything to help her friends out - even if it's illegal and morally dubious.
> 
> Some minor DJWifi, but not enough to justify tagging.

Adrien hesitated, his fingers hovering over the phone as doubts crept over his mind.

“Come on,” Alya urged.

“I don’t know about this,” he said, not wanting to cause a fight, but not entirely comfortable with this, either. “It seems kind of…cruel.”

“It’ll be fine, dude – she’ll laugh, maybe pout, when she figures it out. She won’t be mad. Besides, I know you want to be an actor – isn’t this a great way to practice?”

“I don’t know, Nino,” Adrien said again. They both knew Marinette better than he did, so he should trust their judgment, right? But something in his gut just told him this wouldn’t work out well. She was already a nervous, easily spooked girl – to pull a prank on her like this sounded like a sound way to ruin their friendship.

But Alya and Nino both insisted that it would be okay, funny even, that it would _help_ their friendship. But Adrien didn’t really see how tricking someone would strengthen a friendship – especially when it was Marinette, who he _knew_ didn’t appreciate that sort of thing, given how she reacted to Lila.

But maybe it was different if it was always intended to be a joke? If you always planned on telling them the truth later, if…

Alya impatiently snatched his phone out of his hand and hit call, before smugly shoving it back in his hands as it rang. He scrambled to catch it before it fell – even his quick reflexes just barely able to keep up with Alya’s sudden intervention. He didn’t even have time to come up with further protest, and resigned himself to the plan, hoping that Marinette didn’t get angry with him for this.

“Adrien!” her voice sounding pitched strangely high. Maybe his phone speaker was malfunctioning? “Hi! I call expect…I mean, I wasn’t expecting you to call me!”

He felt bad for startling her even over the _phone_, and he almost backed out right there and then. But Alya and Nino were there, eyes shining eagerly as they silently egged him on, and inwardly, he sighed. They really weren’t going to let him chicken out on this.

“Marinette,” he said, making sure his voice was low and serious, with just a hint of panic laced in. “I need your help. I don’t know what to do.”

“What, what is it?” At once, her entire demeanor changed, her voice returning to a normal pitch and concerned tone as she noted his ostensible urgency. “What’s wrong?”

“It was an accident,” Adrien said, making his own pitch rise slightly, and even adding a little tremble in for effect. “I didn’t mean to do it, I swear, I didn’t mean to…but I think, I think I…he’s not _breathing_, I don’t know what to do…”

“Oh. Oh. Okay. It’ll be okay, Adrien. You need to call an ambulance, and then…do you know how to do chest compressions?” She sounded worried, but calm, and Adrien was relieved that he at least wasn’t making her freak out over something pretend. He was actually a little impressed how level-headed she could be under pressure. It was probably not what Alya and Nino had hoped for, but Adrien was pretty grateful for it.

“It’s…it’s too late for that,” he said, making sure his voice was _really_ shaking now. “He’s been…been gone for a while now, I…I don’t know what to do, I can’t call the police, I can’t go to jail, I can’t let my father know…”

“It’s okay, it’ll be okay, Adrien. I won’t tell anyone. I need you to stay calm, okay? I’m going to hang up, but I’ll be there really soon, I promise. I’ll help you.”

“Tha…thank you, Marinette,” he said, finishing with a watery, wavering quality as he told her where he was.

The call cut off, and he lowered the phone. Nino gave him a big grin and a thumbs up.

“Nice job,” Alya said, also grinning widely. “Very convincing.”

“You’ll definitely make it as an actor,” Nino agreed.

Adrien was pleased at the compliments, but the undercurrent of guilt soured his friends’ belief in him.

“I hope she’s not too upset about this, we’re making her come all the way over here and she sounded worried…”

Alya waved him off dismissively. “You worry almost as much as she does. It’ll be _fine_. Come on, Nino, we’d better get in position.” She gestured him over as they positioned themselves in a dark corner, and Alya threw a tarp over them to look like the hastily hidden crime Adrien had supposedly committed.

And then they waited. Adrien heard the two giggle a few times, and wondered if it wasn’t more likely that Alya and Nino would spoil their own prank.

But he didn’t have long to wait before Marinette came skidding into the alley, dressed in an unusually dark jacket that was slightly undermined by the bright pink oven mitts she was also wearing, as well as the rather conspicuous shovel and rolls of fabric carried awkwardly under her arm.

Adrien froze for a moment, trying to process just what kind of _help_ Marinette intended.

She scanned the alleyway, her eyes settling on him for a moment before glancing around for signs of anyone else. As Alya and Nino were still hidden under the tarp, and mercifully quiet, she found nothing, and immediately marched up to Adrien.

“Okay, here’s the plan,” she began without preamble. “I don’t know how much time we have, and I’ll need to see the body to figure out the best method of disposal, but I’ve mapped out a couple of possible sites we could use. The smell will be a problem, but…”

“Is…is that a shovel?” Adrien interrupted. Stupid question, he knew, but he quite frankly didn’t know how to respond to this – he had completely forgotten the script they’d planned out. Whatever it was, it definitely hadn’t accounted for _this_ anyway.

But Marinette wasn’t fazed by the question at all, merely grimacing.

“Not ideal, I know,” she said, as though they were discussing a perfectly mundane project that they just didn’t have the right tools for. “But it was the best thing I could get on short notice without much traceability. If it won’t work, I have a few other options we could try, but they’ll take longer…”

“What exactly would be _ideal_?” Adrien asked incredulously, because this was _Marinette._ Marinette, who apparently had put a lot more thought into this than anyone reasonably should!

“Ideally, I’d nick Chat Noir’s ring, but that would take much too long,” Marinette said nonchalantly, as though that was just _something she could do_ if she just had enough time. Adrien was starting to have the uncomfortable feeling that she probably _could_.

Dear _god _he hoped she never got akumatized.

“Total disintegration would be the easiest to hide, hardest to trace even if it was found, and through Cataclysm, very quick,” Marinette continued. “But that’s not really a viable option for us at the moment, and there’s nothing else that can really reduce the body to ashes without attracting a lot of attention…”

“Marinette,” he said, surprised at how calm he sounded. “Why are you so willing to be an accessory to murder, and _why_ are you so prepared for it?”

Marinette blinked, as though _surprised _ by the question. Like _he_ was the weird one, here. And look, Adrien may have been home-schooled, but even he could tell this went well beyond the sort of thing people were normally familiar with.

“Because you’re my friend?” Marinette said, the question obviously rhetorical. “And friends help each other out, no matter what.”

“Please tell me you’re not speaking from prior experience.”

Marinette opened her mouth to respond, but stopped as a noise became audible to them both. It sounded like a choked sob, or perhaps a poorly suppressed laugh. And since the sound was coming from under the tarp, Adrien had a pretty safe bet on the latter.

Marinette’s expression changed, from determined to confused, then settling on suspicion. She dropped her shovel and fabric unceremoniously as she stalked over the tarp. Adrien made no attempt to stop her, having already gotten _far _too over his head with this prank already. Let this be Alya’s problem now. Please.

Marinette yanked up the tarp, revealing Alya and Nino clutching each other and shaking with laughter. If Adrien wasn’t mistaken, Alya actually had tears in her eyes from laughing so much. Marinette’s unimpressed glare (which wasn’t all that intimidating, even despite her intentions with coming here) only sent them into further fits.

Marinette turned back to Adrien, and he silently prayed that she wasn’t going to be too upset with him.

“I changed my mind,” she said flatly. “We’re throwing the evidence into the river instead.”

That startled a laugh of his own out of Adrien, and Marinette’s small, pleased smile in response reassured him that she wasn’t actually upset.

Alya actually shrieked (although it quickly devolved into giggles again) as Marinette actually picked her up and shifted her over her shoulder.

“Come on, Adrien, help me carry these ‘bodies’ you so conveniently found,” Marinette said, smirking slightly. “I can’t drag them both to the Seine.”

He approached, moving towards Nino, who scrambled back.

“Don’t you dare,” he said, his words undermined by his grin.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Adrien said, feeling a lot more comfortable with this now that he was on Marinette’s side. “We really _do_ need to get rid of the evidence, after all.”

A short, playful struggle and chase ensued, until the four of them were all collapsed against each other, laughing even as they panted for breath.

“I cannot _believe_ you,” Alya wheezed out. “Literally your first thought after thinking Adrien accidentally killed someone is to _hide the body_?”

“I’d’ve done it for you too,” Marinette said, almost sulkily. Adrien doesn’t doubt it.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Alya said, waggling her eyebrows. Nino groaned.

“Alya, no.”

“I’m not helping if you kill someone on purpose!” Marinette amended hastily. “…Unless they _really_ deserved it.”

“Marinette! Don’t encourage her!”

“Sorry, Nino.”

“I’m still concerned with how prepared you were,” Adrien admitted. “When did you even think of all that stuff?”

“Um…on the way over?” Marinette said sheepishly. “I mean, as soon as I realized what was going on – or rather, what you guys _wanted_ me to think was going on, I was trying to figure out how to deal with it…”

“Your mind scares me,” Nino said. “Remind me never to piss you off.”

Adrien agreed with that. And quite frankly, he was finding himself _very_ glad that Marinette hadn’t stayed pissed at him for more than those first couple of days at the beginning of the school year.

“Maybe you guys should think twice about pulling pranks on me, then,” Marinette teased, though it was obvious to all of them that she didn’t really mean it. “But I suppose, to make it up to me this time, you can help carry my fabric and stuff back to my house. I’ve got a shovel I need to return.”

Adrien considered asking where she got it from, then thought better of it.

But as she stood up, it occurred to him that perhaps Nino and Alya had been right – that this actually was helping to make him better friends with Marinette. And if today had reinforced anything, it was that Marinette was, for all the intense, perhaps slightly concerning ways she showed it, a devoted friend who would go above and beyond for her friends no matter how risky the venture or flawed her friends were.

And that was something more valuable to Adrien than anything else he had ever had.

**Author's Note:**

> Check out my [Dreamwidth](https://peppermint-shamrock.dreamwidth.org/) for daily WIP excerpts and sneak peaks, or follow my [Miraculous Tumblr blog](https://ladyofcreation.tumblr.com/)!


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